The have's can use debt to good effect. The have-not's get killed by debt. In fact, the "not's" typically become "nots" by digging themselves deeper than they can get out.

So there's a balance point that is revealed by an old jokes that goes like this: "If you borrow $250k to buy a business, the bank owns you. If you borrow $250 billion to buy a business, you own the bank."

For sure, it doesn't always work out that way. Lehman's was let to fail. But others were re-floated, just as China won't call in its loans to the US. The US is beholden to its credits, but the US also knows it can flaunt its impecuniousness with impunity.

The point of my post --mainly a note to myself- is that inflation is a serious risk. Clearly, it's one of The Big Five that investors have to worry about, but typically de-emphasize, because its impact is so inconvenient to their modeling and planning.